


the price you pay for losing control

by deerie



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Billy Hargrove Lives, Character Death Fix, Childhood Trauma, F/M, Growing Up, Hospitals, Injury Recovery, Jim "Chief" Hopper Lives, M/M, Post-Canon Fix-It, Recovery, Redemption
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-09
Updated: 2019-09-01
Packaged: 2020-06-25 06:55:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,060
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19740517
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deerie/pseuds/deerie
Summary: Steve doesn’t know why he’s trying so hard to help Billy Hargrove out. Billy has been nothing but an asshole to everyone he comes into contact with. Hell, he’s beaten the shit out of Steve. He threatened Lucas away from Max. He gets in fights all the time and flirts with people he shouldn’t.But there’s got to be something redeemable in there, because otherwise he wouldn’t have stepped between El and the Mind Flayer. He wouldn’t have apologized to Max when he thought he was dying.





	1. Chapter 1

Billy doesn’t die. 

They aren’t sure how at first. The Mind Flayer impaled him with five different tentacles. He should be dead. There was no way he could have survived an attack like that. No one could survive that. 

And yet, Billy lives. Barely.

Max sobs on his chest until the paramedics arrive. 

Steve pulls her away and lets her grip onto his waist, gently herding her out with the rest of the kids. Robin flanks him, her eyes flicking back to the flaming mall every few seconds. 

“Can you,” Steve starts. He stops, because his mind is in a million different places at once and he can’t get a handle on his thoughts. “I don’t know, never mind. Are you okay?”

She nods at him before a paramedic directs her to an ambulance. “Talk later?”

He nods at her. The adrenaline leaves him all at once. “Yeah, later.”

Max’s grip on his waist goes tighter when another paramedic tries to peel her off of Steve. “Hey, hey, it’s fine. They just want to check you out,” he says.

Max looks up at him then, her face tear-streaked, and shakes her head. “I’m okay,” she says. 

Steve gets what she isn’t saying. He shuffles after the paramedic, his gait awkward, and sits in the back of the ambulance with her. 

He doesn’t say anything stupid like, “He’s going to be okay.” 

Instead, he asks, “Do you want to go to the hospital after this?”

Max slips her hand into his and nods miserably. “He can’t die,” she says. “Not when we just got him back.”

Steve thinks distantly that if Billy lives, something has to change. Whatever weird hangups he’s got have to stop, because there’s a little girl who needs him. Billy’s an asshole on a good day, but it’s time to grow up

Steve wraps his left arm around Max and tugs her closer. He rests his chin on her head and says, “I know.”

Max dissolves into tears all over again. 

The paramedic finishes checking them over and they’re free to go. 

Hopper looks like he’s seen better days; he looks a little crispy around the edges, but he’s standing so Steve figures everything must have turned out alright. 

El attaches herself to him firmly as soon as he comes into sight. “You’re okay,” she repeats, over and over, as Hopper palms the back of her head and says, “Yeah, kid, I’m okay.”

Joyce and Will are crying over each other. Johnathan pulls them into a hug as soon as he sees them. 

Nancy has Mike by the arm, like she can’t stand to let him go. She’s bruised across the face and Steve’s face twinges in sympathy. He presses his fingers to the edge of his black eye. Nancy catches his eye and nods, firmly, once.

Steve catches Lucas and pulls him over to the group. The kid’s got a walkie in his hands and Steve thinks, all at once: _Dustin and Erica_.

“Hang on,” Lucas says into the walkie. “I’m sending someone to come pick you up.”

Lucas eyes Max for a second, like he’s taking stock of whether or not she’s hurt, and then continues, “I think we’re meeting at the hospital.”

“Okay,” Dustin says as the radio crackles. “Yeah, we’ll see you there.”

He doesn’t even make a crack about saying _over_ after they’re done speaking. 

This has been the shittiest day, Steve thinks. He doesn’t think he’s ever felt more exhausted. The kids are banged up. El’s powers are taking a sabbatical. 

But they’re all alive, Steve thinks, and then, _Never again_. This never happens again. 

He guesses he has Billy to thank for that; for buying them some extra time when time was running out. 

_Shit_ , Steve thinks. 

The group divides up between Joyce’s station wagon and Hopper’s truck.

Steve says, “I’ll go pick up Dustin and Erica.”

Hopper claps him on the shoulder and asks Max, “You coming?”

Max stays stubbornly by Steve’s side. Hopper frowns, but nods, like he understands what Max isn’t saying. If she doesn’t go to the hospital right away, the longer she has to pretend that Billy will be okay. 

Steve’s heart breaks for her. 

Robin is waiting next to his car when he and Max get there. She hugs him immediately

“I didn’t expect my summer to go like this,” she says into his shoulder, “but if I had to be kidnapped and tortured by Russian spies, I’m glad it was with you.”

Steve huffs a laugh into her hair. Yeah, he’s glad too. “You coming to the hospital with us?”

She nods as they break. She looks down at Max, who’s still stuck to Steve’s side, and asks, “You want shotgun, or you wanna ride in the back with me?”

Steve expects her to pick shotgun, but to his surprise, and possibly Robin’s, she chooses the back. Robin shoots Steve a wide-eyed look, then climbs in after her. Steve slides into the driver’s seat. He looks at the girls in his rear view mirror for a long moment before starting the car. 

  
  
Dustin piles into the backseat beside Robin and lets Erica have the front seat. Steve turns his car back around toward town and starts their journey. 

No time seems to pass at all until they arrive. He pulls into a space in the parking lot, near Joyce’s car. It’s empty, which means everyone has already gone inside. Everyone pauses in his car and Max, whose tears had dried up sometime between picking Dustin and Erica up and whispering back and forth with Robin, start anew. 

Her sobs are ugly, hitching things too. Erica turns her wide eyes on Steve. Steve sucks his bottom lip between his teeth.

Max pushes against Robin a little. “I can’t go in there,” Max cries. “What if I go in there and he’s dead?”

Erica says, “What if Dustin and I go in first?”

Dustin looks down at the walkie in his lap and, to his credit, picks up on what Erica’s implying immediately. “Yeah!” He says. “We’ll go in and let you know if it’s safe to come in.”

Dustin hands his walkie to Max, who clutches at it gratefully. “Lucas will still have his walkie.”

Robin untangles herself from Max and says, “You guys probably need an adult to go with you. It’s weird if two kids walk into the hospital by themselves.”

Max scrambles up into the passenger’s seat as they make their way inside the hospital. She mutters something under her breath, over and over, but Steve can’t make out what she’s saying. 

A few minutes later, the radio crackles to life. “Max, honey, are you there?”

Joyce’s voice spills out of the walkie, which neither Max nor Steve expect. Max fumbles the controls so Steve reaches over and presses the button for her. He says, “We’re here.”

“Okay.” She takes a second, maybe to steel her resolve or something, Steve doesn’t know. “Okay, Max? They’ve taken Billy into surgery. After the surgery is finished, he’ll go to the ICU for a day or so, and then he’ll have to stay at the hospital for a week before he can go home. He’s going to be okay. I promise.”

Steve knows that Joyce isn’t the type of woman to make empty promises. If she’s promising Max that Billy’s going to make it, she means it. 

Max still can’t seem to speak, so Steve presses the button and says, “Thanks, Joyce. We’ll be there in a second.”

Max goes still. Her hair falls in a curtain around her face. 

Steve isn’t sure if she’s relieved or panicking because he can’t see her expression. “Hey, hey,” he says. “You heard Joyce, he’s going to be okay.”

When Max finally looks at him, he realizes that she’s panicking. Shit.

Her eyes are wide when she stares at him, nostrils just barely flaring, and she looks like she might burst into tears again at any moment. “He can’t go home,” she whispers. “Steve, he _can’t_ go home. Neil will kill him.”

There’s a lot to unpack there. Steve makes connections that he doesn’t like. “Okay, look, we have to put that aside for a second. We have a week to figure out what to do and we have people on our side, okay? Joyce and Hopper, right?”

Max exhales slowly and nods. “Okay. Okay, I’m ready to go in.”

  
  
The Party is hesitant to leave Max at the hospital. 

Erica falls asleep slumped against her brother, and Lucas looks like he isn’t too far off either. 

Mike stubbornly says, “Someone has to stay with her.”

Steve is -- Steve is nineteen. There’s no one waiting for him at home. He says, “I’ll stay. You guys go home. We’ll let you know if anything changes.”

Hopper seems okay with that plan. Before he goes, Steve asks if he can speak with him privately. 

“Look,” he says, as soon as they’re alone, “Max doesn’t think that Billy can go home after this.”

Hopper rubs a hand over his eyes and eloquently says, “Goddamn.”

Steve nods because that’s exactly how he feels. “He’s eighteen. He doesn’t have to go home if he doesn’t want to.”

“Okay,” Hopper says. “We’ll figure something out.”

Steve doesn’t know why he’s trying so hard to help Billy Hargrove out. Billy has been nothing but an asshole to everyone he comes into contact with. Hell, he’s beaten the shit out of Steve. He threatened Lucas away from Max. He gets in fights all the time and flirts with people he shouldn’t. 

But there’s got to be something redeemable in there, because otherwise he wouldn’t have stepped between El and the Mind Flayer. He wouldn’t have apologized to Max when he thought he was dying. 

El and Max are talking when Steve returns to the waiting room. Steve doesn’t say anything as he sits in the seat next to Max. 

“See you tomorrow?” El asks Max. 

Max nods and returns the hug El offers her immediately.

El releases her and turns to Steve. She scrutinizes his face and then presses her fingers to the edge of Steve’s black eye. She does it so lightly he doesn’t even flinch.

“I’m okay,” he repeats for her. “Just a little bruised.”

“See you tomorrow?” She asks him. 

He nods. 

She hugs him too. One of his arms settles over her shoulders and he brushes back the hair from her face with the other. Unexpectedly, she tells him, “Thank you.”

Steve doesn’t know what he’s being thanked for, so he squeezes her tighter before he lets her go. 

The surgery seems to stretch on forever. Max falls asleep slumped against him, which can’t be comfortable with the arm rest between them. Neither Billy’s dad nor his step-mom come to the hospital. He wonders if they’ve been notified, and thinks it’s probably better if they don’t come. 

Steve’s starting to give into exhaustion when a nurse comes out. “Hargrove?”

Steve jerks up in his seat. “How’s he doing?”

He makes sure that Max won’t fall out of her chair and then walks over to join the nurse.

She eyes him briefly, because she knows he’s not related to Billy. 

“Look, his dad isn’t coming,” Steve wheedles. “I’ve got his sister. She wants to see him. Hopper said it was fine.”

“Jim Hopper does not run this hospital,” she says, but her eyes soften regardless. “He’s out of surgery. He isn’t very lucid at the moment, but you can go see him in a second. The surgeon stopped the internal bleeding. He’s going to have to stay in the hospital for a week or so, but after that he can go home.”

Steve nods, because this is what Joyce told them before.

“He’s going to have difficulty breathing for a little bit,” the nurse continues. “He’ll need to avoid strenuous activities, like weightlifting, for six weeks at the very least. The incisions will heal over a couple months. He’ll have pain at first, but that should go away as he heals. If it doesn’t, he’ll need to see his doctor.”

“Got it,” Steve says. “Can I take Max to see him?”

“Sure,” she says, “but he may be out of it for a while.”

Max hovers at the door to Billy’s room for a long moment before going inside.

Billy watches her through lidded eyes. 

The covers may have once been pulled up to his shoulders, but he’s pushed the sheet down to his waist and the bandages around his chest are on full display. There’s a chair next to his bed. Max rounds the bed slowly until she can sit on the very edge of the seat. 

Steve hovers at the door, unwilling to step inside and break the moment between them.

Billy tracks Max’s movements carefully. 

Max sets her hands on the side of the bed. 

Billy’s movements, when he moves his arm, are sluggish, but he manages to fit his hand around the back of her neck to pull her closer. 

“Why’re you… why’re you,” he slurs, “cryin’ over me?”

Max’s shoulders shake as she cries silently. She pulls Billy’s hand from her neck and presses her forehead against his knuckles. She abandons the chair entirely, leaning against the bed instead. 

“If you die,” she says, breath hitching, “then I’m alone.”

They have shared history that no one else sees, Steve thinks. He starts putting the pieces together in his mind. Trauma binds people together in ways they don’t expect; Steve knows this first-hand with the group and the Upside-Down, but those were one-off experiences that happened on three separate occasions. He doesn’t want to think about the trauma Billy and Max have shared daily, relentlessly

Steve bites at his thumbnail and kicks his foot mindlessly. 

Max scrambles lightly onto the bed next to Billy. There’s just enough space for her to lay down on her side beside her step-brother. His arm wraps awkwardly her shoulders and Steve knows his arm is going to fall asleep like that, but neither sibling seems to care. 

“Thought I,” Billy says slowly, pausing to catch his breath and highlighting the oxygen cannula in his nose, “did pretty good there at the end.”

“You did,” Max breathes. “You really did.”

In a few minutes, she’s asleep. 

Billy’s eyes flicker to Steve. “You gonna keep standing there like a creep?”

Steve looks out into the hall before he settles in the chair next to the bed with a sigh. Billy breathes like he’s run a marathon. 

“Go to sleep,” Steve says finally. “I’ll keep watch.”


	2. Chapter 2

“What do you think they’re talking about in there?” Max asks Steve for maybe the fifth time. 

Steve has half an idea, but he doesn’t want to get Max’s hopes up. He shrugs again, but Max didn’t look very satisfied after the third time he did that, so he says, “Maybe they’re just tying up loose ends. You know, about the whole case.”

“I thought the government was sweeping all of it under the rug.”

Steve equivocates for a minute. “Man, I don’t know. Who knows what they’re talking about?”

El’s head pops up from where she’s slouched in her seat. 

“No,” Steve says. “No snooping. That’s cheating.”

El glowers at him for a moment. “Not cheating,” she argues.

Steve shakes his head. “Totally cheating.”

“It’s…” she pauses to think about it, “using my resources.”

“Still not doing it,” Steve says. “Whatever it is, it’s private. If Billy wants to tell you about it later, fine, but  _ Billy  _ has to make that choice.”

It’s in moments like these where Steve feels immeasurably old. He’s only nineteen, damn.

“You can’t tell me you never cheated in school,” Max says dubiously.

Steve rolls his eyes. “That’s different,” he says. “That’s school. This is--” he stops, trying to think of the right word. “This is emotions.”

El and Max both eye him for a moment, but ultimately back down. Success, Steve thinks, and then immediately curses at himself, because he’s sure he’s jinxed himself. 

_ No fear _ , he tells himself. First rule of babysitting: show no fear. Kids pick up on it like blood in the water. 

Honestly, Steve isn’t sure that El can even snoop at the moment. Her powers still haven’t returned and it’s been about a week since Billy’s surgery, since the showdown at Starcourt Mall. He can’t stand to see the disappointed frown that mars her face each time she tries to use her powers and can’t. 

It bums him out. He can’t imagine how El must feel. 

“Bet you’ll get to wheel him out of the hospital,” Steve whispers to Max. “They aren’t going to let him walk out of the building.”

Something sparkles in Max’s eyes. She looks positively delighted at the prospect.

Hopper opens the door. Both girls straighten up in their seats. 

Hopper looks tired and a little annoyed, but he doesn’t look angry, which means he got his way. Steve leans over until he can peer through the open door at Billy. 

Billy looks -- well, Billy looks pissed, but also resigned and maybe a little relieved. He flips Steve off when he catches sight of him. 

“As soon as the doctors discharge him, he’s going to Joyce’s,” Hopper says. 

Max looks so relieved she might start crying again. Steve hopes not. Tears are a lot to handle from anyone, but especially Max. 

Max jumps out of her chair and hugs Hopper around the waist. She lets go almost immediately when she realizes what she’s done and looks mortified at herself. 

Hopper has a nearly identical look on his face; it’s hilarious. 

Max, bright red, stares at her hands like they’ve betrayed her.

“Gives good hugs,” El hums under her breath. She looks between the pair and amends, “When he’s ready.”

“Thanks, kid,” Hopper huffs, rolling his eyes. “I’m going to go find the doctor.”

“Be back soon,” El tells him.

The three of them loiter out in the hall beside Billy’s room until they hear the crash of Billy pushing something off his bedside table. 

Steve hopes its not the vase of flowers Nancy brought. Nancy doesn’t like Billy, but he stepped between the Mind Flayer and El and that goes a long way. It goes a long way for a lot of them. 

Steve follows El and Max into the room. A puddle of water seeps away from the gaudy plastic flower vase and flowers lay strewn across the floor. El gathers the flowers into a bouquet and holds them in her lap when she sits in the chair beside the hospital bed. 

“Was it all you hoped for and more?” Steve asks as he picks up the vase and sets it back on the table.

Billy frowns and crosses his arms. “I thought it would be more satisfying,” he says dully. 

He’s almost pouting, Steve thinks. He turns away to get paper towels to sop up the mess. 

Billy looks better. He can sit up on his own now, and he wears his own clothes, a soft-looking shirt and sleep pants that Max had retrieved from their house. The edges of bandages peek out where his shirt rides up. 

Max sits on the end of the bed and swings her feet back and forth. 

El makes a surprised noise behind them. Steve’s head whips around so fast to find the source of the surprise and he drops all of the paper towels in his hands. 

El has one hand extended, a familiar look of concentration of her face. In the space above the bed, a single flower trembles in the air, held aloft by nothing other than El’s powers. 

After a few seconds, the flower drops onto the bed. A thin trickle of blood runs from her nose. A brilliant smile lights across her face. 

Max whoops and snatches the flower off the bed, fist pumping in excitement. El glances at Steve and he smiles back at her. 

“Whoa,” Billy says, snatching the tissue box off his bedside table. He looks at El, concerned by the blood. “Here, kid.”

El takes a few and shoves them under her nose. “It’s coming back,” she says.

“Does that always happen?” Billy gestures at his nose. 

El nods. Billy makes a sound under his breath that Steve can’t decipher. When El isn’t looking at Billy anymore, his brow furrows. 

“Why don’t you take it easy, El?” Steve says. “It’s like you’re recovering from an injury too.”

El glowers at him again, but says, “Okay.”

Hopper chooses this moment to come in with a nurse in tow. He takes in the scene, from Steve standing next to a puddle with paper towels strewn around him like confetti to Billy who looks very concerned about  _ something  _ and a little pissed off about it to Max and El chattering happily to each other with flowers in their laps, and says resolutely, “I don’t want to know. Clean up that mess, I would absolutely hate for Billy to slip right before he checks outs.”

Steve puts his hands on his hips and stares down at the paper towels scattered around him. He mutters, “That is what I am trying to do.”

Billy snorts from his perch on the bed. He swings his legs around so he sits on the edge and says, “Yeah, Harrington, get to it.”

Steve magnanimously ignores him as he crouches down to sop up the mess. 

The nurse comes farther into the room and hands Billy a clipboard. “I need you to sign here. You’re going to need to follow-up with your doctor in six weeks to make sure your incisions have healed properly.”

Billy signs his name on the line.

“Make sure you rest as much as possible,” the nurse continues. “You need to avoid strenuous activity like weightlifting or swimming, For the first four weeks, you’ll need to avoid driving. Absolutely no smoking, Billy, you hear me?”

Billy groans and says, “That’s, like, every hobby I have.”

“Find new ones,” she says unsympathetically. “Avoid people who are sick. Do the breathing exercises we taught you every day. Make sure you try and walk every day. If you need to cough, make sure you hold a pillow against the incision. I gave Hopper your prescription for a painkiller, to be used as needed.”

Billy nods and runs a hand through his hair. He jerks his head in a nod.

“I don’t want to see you here again,” The nurse says firmly. 

“Yeah,” Billy agrees. “Me neither.”

“I’ll go get the wheelchair,” she says, eyes narrowing, “as per hospital policy.”

Billy groans like everyone expected, but Steve can kind of make out the relief in his eyes for a second before it disappears. 

“Steve,” Hopper says. “I need you to meet us at Joyce’s. I need you to do something for me.”

“You got it, Hop,” Steve says. 

Steve regrets agreeing to help Hopper as soon as they pull up to the front of the Hargrove house. His stomach ties itself in knots. His mouth pulls into a frown.

Hopper throws the truck into park and then drums his fingers on the steering wheel. “I’ve got a list of things he wants,” he says. 

Steve nods and accepts the list from him. Billy’s handwriting is surprisingly neat. Steve isn’t sure what he expected: maybe chicken scratch or jagged letters, but not the neatly rounded letters he finds.

He reads through the list carefully, steels his resolve, and says, “Okay. Okay, yeah, let’s do this.”

Hopper gets out first, rounding the side of his truck, and waits for Steve. Steve follows him up the front sidewalk to the front door. The front porch light flickers, casting Steve in shadow behind Hopper’s bulk. 

Hopper knocks on the door three times. 

A frazzled-looking woman answers the door. This must be Max’s mom. Steve can see the similarities in the deep red tone of her hair, in the shape of her face. That’s where they stop; this woman is meek where Max is unapologetic. 

“Chief Hopper,” she greets quietly. “Neil's out, but I don’t know what time he gets home.”

“That’s alright, Mrs. Hargrove. We’re just here to pick up some of Billy’s things.”

Mrs. Hargrove closes her eyes for a long moment. “Is he,” she starts and stops. “Neil said Billy didn’t want us to visit him in the hospital. Is he okay?”

“He’s doing better,” Hopper says. “If you would like to see him, I think it would probably be okay.”

Mrs. Hargrove looks like she might cry. She breathes heavily for a moment. “Billy’s room is upstairs,” she says to Steve. “Second door on the right.”

Steve nods and heads for the stairs, trying hard not to look around. Steve’s house is cold, empty, but Steve has never doubted that his parents love him in their roundabout way. Billy’s house is lived-in, but there’s something tense in the air, like something might bite at any moment. He doesn’t want to examine it too closely. 

He makes his trip as short as possible, gathering up Billy’s clothes and a box that he specified was under the bed. He shoves everything into a bag Hopper gave him. There are a couple books that Billy wanted, some records and pictures. Once the bag is full of the parts of Billy’s life that he wants to keep, Steve shoulders it and heads for the stairs. 

The sound of a slamming car door interrupts him. 

Steve lingers on the stairs, out of sight. Mrs. Hargrove and Hopper are still talking, but Steve watches the way that Mrs. Hargrove tenses at the sound of her husband coming in the house. 

“I heard he saved some kids,” Mrs. Hargrove says to Hopper. 

“Yes, ma’am,” Hopper confirms. “He's a hero.”

“If he was such a hero,” Neil Hargrove says, joining the pair, “then why isn’t he coming home?”

He says it meanly, like he doesn’t believe what Hopper is saying. Steve watches as Hopper’s stance changes, hand resting above his gun. He looms over Neil. 

“I think we all know why Billy isn’t coming home,” Hopper says. 

Steve chooses this moment to come down the stairs. He hitches the bag higher on his shoulder and comes to stand at Hopper’s side. He stares at Neil Hargrove. This is a man who beats his son. Steve feels a little sick. 

“You ready to go?” Hopper asks him. 

Steve nods. 

“It was nice talking to you, Mrs. Hargrove,” Hopper says. To Neil, he extends a hand. Neil takes it, although Steve can tell how angry he is. The anger rolls off of him in waves. 

Hopper squeezes Neil’s hand and tugs him closer so he can tell him, “If I so much as hear that you’ve been beating on someone else, it’s over for you.”

Hopper releases Neil and stares at him like he’s dirt on his shoe. “Come on, Steve.”

Steve shakes a little when they’re back in the car. It’s one thing to stare down a monster from another dimension, and it’s an entirely different thing to stare down a monster in a person’s body. Steve thinks about the kids he’s collected in the past couple of years and feels sick to his stomach. He can’t imagine wanting to hit any of them. 

Their drive back to Joyce’s is quiet. Hopper breaks the silence eventually. “I’m sorry that you had to see that,” he says, “but I’m not sorry that you did.”

Steve jerks his head toward Hopper, but doesn’t reply. 

“I didn’t do this to excuse Billy’s past actions, because those are on him,” Hopper continues, “but I do want you to know why he is the way he is.”

“You really think he’s a hero?”

Hopper nods. “I think he’s been dealt a shitty hand his entire life. I think he’s scared. But the moment that it mattered, he stepped up. He saved El’s life. He deserves a second chance.”

“Yeah,” Steve breathes. “You’re right.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1\. This may end up being more than three chapters.   
> 2\. The title is cribbed from the song "Okay, I Believe You But My Tommy Gun Don't" by Brand New. I messed up the lyrics when I was titling this fic, but then I liked this more.   
> 3\. We're not even to the part that inspired this whole fic, jeez.
> 
> Thanks for reading! Come follow me on Twitter at [@afuturetime](http://www.twitter.com/afuturetime).


	3. Chapter 3

Billy feels like a ghost on Joyce’s sofa. 

He tracks the hallway with his eyes, acutely aware that this is the place that he nearly killed Steve Harrington. Putting him here has got to be some sort of inventive torture that Chief Hopper’s managed to think up. If Hopper hadn’t decided to have a talk with Billy right before he left the hospital, Billy would be losing his mind. 

And, well, the jury’s still out on that one. Turns out, a lot of crazy shit happens in Hawkins, Indiana. Turns out, there are monsters here. 

Turns out, maybe Billy is a monster too.

“No,” El says. She sits somewhere off to his left. 

Shit, Billy didn’t think he was talking out loud. He says as much to her.

“You weren’t,” she says. 

He swings his gaze over to her. She’s been a constant presence at his side since Hopper dropped him on the couch in the Byers’ living room; Max, too, but she’s been in the kitchen with Joyce for the past ten minutes. 

“Is that one of your things?” He asks, wiggling his fingers slowly at her. 

El nods once. “Sorry,” she says. “Steve says it’s cheating.”

Billy shrugs. He’s kind of out of it, due to the painkillers Joyce rationed out for him. Everything feels kind of wiggly and dreamlike. 

El had been a shadow at the hospital: always there, and so quiet. Quieter than she had been in his mind, or whatever that place had been. Max -- Max makes more sense, even if her continued presence makes no sense at all either. 

Billy doesn’t know how either of them can stand the sight of him. He thinks of El, struggling underneath him, and how she told him of his mother.  _ She was really pretty. _

His mom would be so ashamed of how he’s acted, the choices he’s made: how he’s treated Max, the fights, how he more closely resembles Neil and the reasons she decided to leave.

_ You were happy …  _ El’s tearful voice plays on repeat in his head. 

Billy feels sick to his stomach. He leans back on the couch a little more because he can’t lean forward and tries to will away the nausea. It doesn’t really work. 

He isn’t sure when he stopped being happy, but it probably happened somewhere between his mother’s departure and his father’s fists. 

He isn’t sure he knows what happiness feels like anymore. 

The couch dips and he slides his eyes over to Max. Her brow is furrowed like she’s concerned about him, but that can’t be right, not after all the shit he put her and her friends through. 

“Ms. Byers went to fix the guest room for you,” she says quietly. “Mom said I could spend the night, but after that I have to go home.

Billy thinks of Neil and says, “If he touches you, you tell me."

“Actually, you tell me,” Hopper says as he comes in the door, “and I throw his ass in jail.”

Billy blinks up at Hopper. Steve stands a little way behind him, face sort of shell-shocked and clutching a bag. 

“Go ask Joyce where to put that,” Hopper instructs Steve. 

Steve manages a slight nod and goes to find her. 

Billy may be up to his eyeballs in painkillers, but he thinks he puts the pieces together pretty quickly. After a moment of disbelief, he says, “You took  _ Harrington  _ to my house?”

Hopper stares at him for a moment and then says, “Yes.”

Billy sneers at him. 

“Don’t be mad,” Max says quietly. “I was going to go, because I know where all your stuff is, but I was afraid-”

She stops short and Billy moves his head enough to look at her. She looks like she wants to inch closer. 

“I was afraid your dad wouldn’t let me come back.”

Billy dips his head and doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t look at Hopper, however. He doesn’t want anyone to know what goes on in that house, and yet it seems like now everyone does. 

Hopper sighs and walks out of the room. 

Max gives in and slouches against the couch, just barely brushing Billy’s arm. “Sorry,” she says to his shoulder. 

“Your dad,” El says, “is like Papa.”

Billy knows she isn’t talking about Hopper. He isn’t sure how Hopper and El are related, but he knows Papa isn’t Hopper. 

“A bad man,” El settles on. “Bad, bad men.”

“Yeah,” Billy huffs. “Yeah, I guess so.”

  
  
  
  


Steve helps Joyce put clean sheets on the bed in the guest room. Joyce shakes a pillow into a pillow case and asks, “Are you okay?”

Steve shrugs. “Sure.”

“Did you call your parents? Are they coming home?”

Steve frowns and says, “No, I--”

He doesn’t want to explain how his dad said his business at the moment was more important or how his mom reluctantly asked him if she needed to come home but her tone made Steve feel badly and he told her not to worry about it. 

“No,” he says. “It’s fine.”

Joyce stares at him for a moment, mouth curling down at the sides as she nods. “You need anything, you come here,” she says. “You know you’re always welcome.”

She drops the pillow on the bed and gathers him up into a hug. Steve dips his head onto her shoulder and says, “Thanks.”

Her sweater is soft under his forehead. He wishes his mom would hug him like this. Joyce runs a hand over his head and squeezes him tighter for a moment before she lets him go. 

She runs her hands over his shoulders and smooths out the wrinkles in his shirt. “Are you staying tonight?”

Steve wants to. He really wants to, but he knows she’s going to have a full house with her kids and El, plus Billy and Max. The thought of going back to his empty house sits like a stone in his belly.

He even starts to say no, but then Joyce crosses her arms and interrupts him.

“Why am I even asking, of course you’re staying,” she says. She eyes him, like she knows he’s going to continue to protest and says, “I could really use your help.”

Steve stares at her and wonders when she got to know him well enough to pin him like this. She smiles under his scrutiny and pats his arm. 

“Gotcha,” she says. “Now, come help me with the rest of the blankets. I’m gonna set El up in Will’s room and you’ll need some bedding if you’re going to take my couch.”

  
  
  


El levitates the pillows onto the couch just to prove to everyone that her powers are coming back. 

“Well, I’ll be damned,” Hopper says, bending back a little at the waist. He ruffles El’s hair. “I’d a’loved you even without your powers, kid.”

El turns her secretive smile on him and says, “I know.”

In the background, Joyce clasps her hands together and smiles brightly. “Look at you,” she says to Hopper. “Looks like you don’t need any help speaking from the heart.”

Hopper’s face rumples in that old man kind of way. He scoffs a little bit in her direction and heads to hide in the kitchen. 

El starts to scrub away the blood trickling from her nose with her jacket sleeve, but Steve catches her arm and shoots her a dour look. “At least use some tissue from the bathroom or something,” he says. 

El laughs at him and says, “Told you.”

Steve rolls his eyes, but is mollified when she heads for the bathroom. His ears pink as he feels Joyce’s eyes on him. He’s saved from defending himself by Joyce following Hopper into the kitchen, probably to heckle him some more. 

Max goes with El to the bathroom, probably to talk about her powers some more or gossip about whatever it is a preteen tomboy and her super-powered best friend talk about. Who knows? Steve doesn’t want to know. 

Steve also doesn’t really want to be alone in the room with Billy in the house where Billy beat the shit out of him, even if Billy is incapacitated -- even if Billy saved their lives against the Mind Flayer. 

He fidgets underneath Billy’s unfocused gaze. 

“Man,” Billy finally slurs, “this is so fucking weird.”

Steve huffs out an unexpected laugh and says, “You’re telling me.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy my birthday, here's a new chapter.

**Author's Note:**

> I feel very tentative about this whole thing, because I don't think Billy deserves more of a redemption arc than he gets briefly in the show. But an idea came to me and I had to write it and so here I am. I'm also leaving out a particularly important tag at the moment, because it hasn't appeared yet in the fic and I'm not really sure exactly how to phrase it. It'll come to me. You'll see. 
> 
> Anyway, follow me on twitter at [@afuturetime](http://www.twitter.com/afuturetime)!


End file.
